Starbucks Has A Great New Plan For Their Leftover Food

Starbucks may be your favorite spot for a fancy cup of joe—one tall latte with caramel drizzle, please!— but the coffee chain is adding a new reason to love them: a FoodShare program. The chain will soon donate surplus ready-to-eat meals, like salads and sandwiches, to feed those in need with the help of Food Donation Connection and Feeding America. The brand's 7,600 company-operated U.S. stores will participate in the endeavor, and they estimate in the first year of the program they'll be able to provide nearly five million meals to those who need nourishment. By 2021, they could donate as many as 50 million meals.

The idea for FoodShare came straight from the employees in their stores. “Like many of our social impact initiatives, the innovation and inspiration comes from our partners who are volunteering in and contributing to their communities,” Starbucks senior vice president John Kelly says in the company's announcement. “They saw the need for us to do more, and find a way to use our scale to bring more nourishing and ready-to-eat meals to those in need.”

It's not the first time Starbucks has donated food. The company began donating leftover pastries in 2010. But now, they're working with FDC to donate perishable food—which previously had to be tossed—and help even more people in need. Refrigerated vans will pick up the food from participating stores and deliver it to the Feeding America network for distribution. By this time next year, the vans will be in full operation.

The issue at hand is very real: Feeding America reports that in 2014, 48.1 million Americans lived in food insecure households, meaning they didn't have access to adequate, nutritious food. The non-profit says that people in a food insecure household are "disproportionally affected by diet-sensitive chronic diseases such as diabetes and high blood pressure."

Starbucks is making a major move by setting up a comprehensive FoodShare program, and they hope other chains will follow suit, too. The more restaurants donating healthy meals, the better.